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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 11/20/2012 11:24 AM, Scott Plante
wrote:<br>
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<div style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size:
12pt; color: #000000"><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif"
size="3">I found that very surprising, so I did a bit of
googling. I think that must have been meant as a bit of
hyperbole. They were asked to take an 8% cut, of which they'd
get 4% back next year, and to start paying 17% of their
healthcare instead of their current 0%. Here are a few more
surprising facts I came across:</font>
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<div><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">--Hostess
paid out almost $100 million in health benefits for
retirees last year, but over half of it covered workers
who never had worked at Hostess. The Teamsters’ onerous
and antiquated “multi-employer pension plan” foists the
pension obligations of a bankrupt company on to the
balance sheets of surviving rivals—ensuring a steady
death spiral in any declining industry. A similar “MEPP”
almost killed YRC, one of the largest trucking
companies.</font></div>
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<font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">Sounds onerous until it's
realized that there are contractual obligations for pensions and
benefits to employees and retirees. Most companies signed those
and are now trying to get out of them as they spent the last 30
years underfunding the plans to prop up profit margins on paper.
</font>Once retired, pensioners no longer have a say in things. As
the union contracted to provide the funds with corp funding, it's
the usual insurance game of make whose left pay the bill. If enough
payers leave, the ponzie-scheme collapses. Another "infinite growth"
financial plan. <br>
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<div><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">--Union rules
forced Hostess to run separate truck fleets for
delivering bread vs. sweets. A sweets driver, serving a
7-11 store, was forbidden from restocking shelves with
breads already delivered and waiting in the back—he had
to call for a bread driver to swing by and handle.</font></div>
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<font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">That's pretty bone-headed.
Maybe the sweets guys were immune to the smell </font>of cinnamon
but allergic to gluten :-)<br>
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<div><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">--The union
restrictions on the 5,500 distribution routes at Hostess
made it unprofitable to serve tiny outlets, yet Hostess
was barred from using smaller, sleeker—and
non-union—distributors.</font></div>
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<font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">That's common practice</font>
to carve up a region to protect self-interests. It happens in sales
and marketing as well (very non-unionized) and is a double-edged
sword. Non-union distribution is like outsourcing IT jobs to low
wage countries. Once it starts, the end point is no one makes a
decent living in the starting point area. Until problems come up,
rebuilding the trust and relationships that fosters the tremendous
growth between 1955 and 1971 or so of unions and corps is a moot
point. Cheapest labor means a fatter bottom line as long as someone
is buying the products. Thus we have to "export" goods to grow
because the disposable income here is declining.<br>
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<div><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">--Workers
were asked to take an 8% pay cut and pay 17% of their
health-care costs instead of zero. Welcome to the club,
guys. For this, they would have received 25% ownership
of Hostess plus $100 million of Hostess debt to be paid
back to the unions.</font></div>
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<font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">25% of Hostess is what,
$11.42?</font> I really haven't followed the details of the
twinkie makers long death march. I do know that a deep fried twinkie
covered in powder sugar and chocolate sprinkles was declared AMAZING
by my son and a friend. I fried it but didn't try it :-)<br>
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<div><font face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">From: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://goo.gl/BR9uX">http://goo.gl/BR9uX</a></font></div>
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial,
helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; "><br>
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<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial,
helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; ">Apparently, the
best you can do with unemployment is 46.9% of your pay,
and it goes as low as 20.6%. </div>
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial,
helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; "><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://goo.gl/WA5T6">http://goo.gl/WA5T6</a></div>
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<br>
Unemployment funding is no incentive to not work. It sucks. Given
the typical household budget breakdowns, it will only cover roof and
maybe partial food. Health insurance goes away as does car
insurance, internet, and any ability to pay any other bills
including water, power, and gas. Any consumer credit bills go unpaid
which in turn ruins the credit rating thus potentially damaging the
ability to regain full employment and continue paying all bills as
per usual.<br>
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<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: arial,
helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; "><br>
<span style="font-size: medium; ">By the way, the judge
has ordered them back into mediation today. Perhaps
they'll stay open yet.</span></div>
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There's some blurb of a private corp doing a buy out as well.<br>
<blockquote
cite="mid:1754800068.1586.1353428689373.JavaMail.root@insightsys.com"
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<div style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);
font-weight: normal; font-style: normal;
text-decoration: none; font-family: Helvetica, Arial,
sans-serif; "><b>From: </b>"Jim Kinney"
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:jim.kinney@gmail.com"><jim.kinney@gmail.com></a><br>
<b>To: </b>"Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts"
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:ale@ale.org"><ale@ale.org></a><br>
<b>Sent: </b>Saturday, November 17, 2012 9:27:43 AM<br>
<b>Subject: </b>Re: [ale] Way OT - the death of
Twinkies<br>
<br>
<p>Ouch! To make more on unemployment than at the new
pay rate. OUCH! No wonder they walked out.</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Nov 17, 2012 9:21 AM,
"Lightner, Jeff" <<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:JLightner@water.com" target="_blank">JLightner@water.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
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.8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
My first thought on hearing about this the other day
was of the movie Zombieland in which Woody
Harrelson's character's main driving force is the
search for the "last twinkies". A funny bit was
when his traveling companion blasts through a door
with a shotgun only to find the only box of twinkies
on the other side of it blasted as well. :-)<br>
<br>
Twinkies won't go away - in the company's statement
they made the comment that the brands would likely
be sold.<br>
<br>
Interestingly their main union had actually signed a
contract and it was a lesser union that went on
strike. A co-worker of mine said that he had heard
or read that other union did it because they decided
they'd make more money on unemployment than with the
new contract with all the concessions it had.<br>
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<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
James P. Kinney III
Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you gain at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail. It won't fatten the dog.
- Speech 11/23/1900 Mark Twain
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://electjimkinney.org">http://electjimkinney.org</a>
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